In time, bonfire was also applied to other large conflagrations, such as those for the burning of yard refuse or unwanted possessions.ĭivine knowledge will make a man rejoyce, when his enemies makes a bonfire of his goods.īonfires were also held in worship of saints, which ignited the word's general meaning of an open-air fire around which people gathered and celebrated. Third, the spelling in the word's earliest attestation is in the form banefyre, and bane is a spelling of bone which long continued common in Scotland.

Second, knowing that the word goes back to the 15th century, we might expect it to have evolved to boonfire, since boon (as in 'boon companion') is the English form that developed from the French bon. First, the creation posited by early lexicographers would be a somewhat unusual hybrid: exactly why a French word would be joined with an English one (the word fire is purely Anglo-Saxon) is hard to rationalize. There are a few key points in favor of the 'bone fire' etymology. A nothir is clene wode & no bones & that is callid a wode fyre fore people to sitte & to wake there by. On was clene bones & no wode & that is callid a bone fyre. The word is actually derived from Middle English bonefire, meaning literally 'a fire of bones.' (Way cooler etymology, right?) The earliest appearance of the word is glossed ignis ossium-Latin for 'fire of bones.' And a citation from the 15th century confirms that this is not just a learned folk-etymology.īut in worshipp of seinte iohan the people woke at home & made iij maner of fyres.

Born in the fire america